I love a good retelling! I saw this pop up on Netgalley and had to throw out a request for it. This was a fun re-imagined YA-ish settling of Beauty and The Beast. This one was a little slow rolling for me but the world crafting was excellent.
I am a big lover of the romance parts of a read, so the fact that that wasn't the fore front for this read gave me a bit of pause, but at the end of the day it was a riveting read page after page. I loved the crafting of the world and the twists on the story that we all know. It kept me engaged and enchanted as I read.
Retellings have a special spot for me. I love the fact that loosely, we know where the story is going to go. We know the end game. But all of the parts in-between, all of those are up for grabs. This was one of the reads that plays very close to the known tale in some points, but browns and changes in a large way for others.
A solid 4 star read for me with a fantastic cast and beautiful world.
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Synopsis:
A luxuriously magical retelling of
Beauty and the Beast set in seventeenth-century France--and told from the point of view of the Beast himself.
I am neither monster nor man—yet I am both.
I am the Beast.
He is a broken, wild thing, his heart’s nature exposed by his beastly form. Long ago cursed with a wretched existence, the Beast prowls the dusty hallways of his ruined château with only magical, unseen servants to keep him company—until a weary traveler disturbs his isolation.
Bewitched by the man’s dreams of his beautiful daughter, the Beast devises a plan to lure her to the château. There, Isabeau courageously exchanges her father’s life for her own and agrees to remain with the Beast for a year. But even as their time together weaves its own spell, the Beast finds winning Isabeau’s love is only the first impossible step in breaking free from the curse . . .
